Broken Glass
by Daemon Feles
Summary: Broken Glass: The Cheshire Cat's Adventures beyond Wonderland. Based on the books, a certain Cat wakes up to find his whole world turned upside down.  Rated T for possible violence in later chapters.
1. Broken Class

_**Chapter One**_

The first thing that the cat was aware of was a dull throbbing pain in the back of his head. He then noticed that he was cold and, more importantly, wet. The next thing that creeped into his awareness was the smell of dirt, grime and other nasty things that he didn't want to dwell on. He slowly opened his eyes, blinking several times to clear his vision, hoping that the world would stop spinning in such a disconcerting manner.

Fear suddenly overtook him as he realized that he had no idea where he was or how he had gotten there. He struggled to get up in a mad panic, but his limbs refused to work properly, causing him to flop about like a landed codfish. It took a few moments for him to realize how silly he probably looked (clearly this was undignified behavior for a cat), so he stopped moving in an effort to regain his composure.

After taking a few deep breaths, he slowly sat up, discovering more bruised bits of his anatomy along the way, and assessed his surroundings. He was in an alley way of some sort, littered with broken crates and barrels. The cobblestone ground was covered in puddles of what he hoped was mud, and of course he had been laying in the middle of one of them.

With a snarl of disgust he gingerly hobbled out of the puddle, trying to shake the worst of it off of himself, causing his fur to stick out in untidy spikes. The urge to groom was nearly overpowering, but the thought of cleaning himself only to get more of the filth on him when he tried to leave this place made him shutter. He just need to get home so he could tidy up properly and then...

The cat froze, mid thought, as he realized in horror that he didn't know where home was or even what it was... He didn't even know who he was. This was impossible, how could he forget himself? He needed to see himself. The cat scanned the refuse scattered about the alleyway until he found what he was looking for, a broken looking glass.

He peered into the cracked surface and couldn't shake the feeling that something was completely off about it. Despite the filth covering his fur he knew at least his coloring was right, a mackerel tabby with a dark brown undercoat (he wasn't quite he how he knew this, he just did), and his large green eyes seemed somewhat familiar.. But something was missing (besides his identity) and it felt terribly wrong.

He pressed a paw against the glass and was started at the fact it didn't go through. He shook his head in puzzlement. Why should he think that he could pass through? The cat sat down heavily, trembling at the cold, wanting to be somewhere warm and dry even if it smelled of pepper. Again the cat paused, confused by his own strange thoughts. He had to find out where he was and how to get home. He couldn't just stay here wallowing like a Mock-turtle in it's soup. He stood up, despite his aches, and carefully crept out of the alleyway out into the street.

As he stepped out towards the road, he was assailed by a cacophony of humans hustling and bustling about. His ears flattened against his head in an effort to block the noise out. 'It's noisier than Hatter's tea party,' he absently mused to himself before suddenly realizing this was another scrap of memory. The cat pounced on the thought, hoping to pin it down and examine it. Unfortunately it slipped through his paws like mist.

He didn't have time to dwell on his fleeting memory, as he was nearly trod upon by a large pair of boots. He ducked out of the way, and had a mind to give the oaf who nearly trampled him a severe tongue lashing, when he suddenly felt something strange. It was if something, some invisible force, had grabbed hold of the center of his chest, and was trying to pull him towards it. This alien sensation frightened him, but he didn't know where else to go or what else to do.. The cat followed the pulling force, leaving the alleyway behind.

The cat clung close to walls, dashing under any available cover, as he followed the beckoning force. It led him on a zig-zag path through the city, going up and down alleyways, along store fronts and down winding streets that twisted and turned so many times it made him dizzy. He began to doubt that following this unknown force was such a good idea, but he kept going. He was sure he was going to be led to someplace dreadful, but he didn't stop. He started to doubt his sanity at this point. Only someone who was mad would do such an continue on a path that surely lead to some sort of unspeakable doom.  
_We're all mad here..._

Another fractured memory of him saying these words to.. someone. The cat shook his head in frustration as he turned to another alley, but slowed down as a sense of foreboding overtook him. There was something bad in the alley with him. He could feel it in the tips of his whiskers.


	2. The Cat and the Rat

**Chapter 2**

_The Cat and the Rat_

Something skittered in the darkness behind him, causing the cat to let out a startled yowl. He quickly turned towards the noise, his matted full attempting (but failing) to puff itself out in an effort to make him look bigger than he was.

The cat was practically whisker to whisker with a rat. A mangy, beady eyed and really, really, REALLY large rat. The cat's lip curled up in a snarl. He didn't like rats at all. Mice on the other hand he found quite pleasant. They were polite, tidy and great conversationalists, while rats.. Well rats had no manners at all and were exceedingly crude. This train of thought startled the cat. Had he ever been in a conversation with a mouse? Could mice even talk? The cat shook it's head and turned it's attention to his problem at hand. The rat.

He and the rat eyed each other warily. The rat paced back and forth in front of him, chittering in a jeering sort of way, as if goading him into a fight. Even though the wretched little beast was annoying him, the Cat decided that perhaps the rat wasn't worth the trouble. He could probably trounce it, but he just wanted out of this alley as quickly as possible. The cat slowly backed away from the rat, not trusting it enough for him to turn his back on it, when he hear a sound that made his hackles rise and a cold knot of fear form in the pit of his stomach.

His ear was filled with a horrific cacophony of chitters and squeaks. Because he had been distracted by the rat, it allowed it's filthy brethren to surround him. The cat shark in on himself, feeling hundreds of beady eyes stare at him with malicious glee. This was very, very bad. He was severely outnumbered and outmatched. Several of the other rats were even bigger than the first one and he finally admitted to himself that he probably wouldn't have been able to take on that one in the first place.

The rats began to circle and draw closer to him with a slow and sadistic deliberateness. The cat cast his gaze around, desperate for a means of escape. His eyes caught on a staggered pile of boxes and crates that created a sort of trail that lead to a high stone fence. Just above the fence he caught a heartening sight of green, maybe a hedge or a tree. Rats didn't climb trees, did they? he thought to himself frantically. No. Tree climbing was a cat's job, he decided desperately.

He spotted an opening near some of the smaller rats, where the boxes looked like they would keep him just out of the rats reach long enough for him to escape. He quickly coiled his body like a spring before launching himself at the crate. As he flew through the air he had an image of himself landing gracefully at his destination, before making a daring escape, leaving the rats behind in the dust and filth. It was a nice thought, unfortunately it wasn't meant to be.

Just as the cat's forepaws landed on the box, one of the rats leaped up and sunk it's sharp teeth into his tail. The cat let out a painful screech as his scrabbling claws attempted to dig into the wood, desperate to keep the rat from pulling him down to become a midnight snack for it's brothers and sisters.

With adrenaline fueled effort the cat clawed his way up, hissing as he felt his poor tail being skinned and shredded by the rat's teeth. He managed to kick out hard with one of his back legs, making contact with the vermin, and felt giddy relief as the rat released him with a squeal of pain.

He had to run, run, run, run, RUN, his focus directly in front of him, trying not to look back as he heard the rats scrabbling up the box behind him. The fence and the line of green were like a beacon to him and suddenly he was there. His paws reached the top of the stone fence and he stopped, wobbling dangerously as he almost tipped over the edge. The line of green he saw was in fact a large, sturdy looking branch. _I'm going to make it,_ he thought with hysterical glee. _I'm actually going to get away and be safe.._ His back legs coiled once more as he again launched into the air, his injured tail streaming a trail of crimson behind him. The branch loomed before him and he drew closer and closer and.. completely missed the branch.

The cat let out a howl of pain and frustration as he plummeted to the ground. The fall wasn't too far but it was jarring, especially with his injuries. To his credit, he managed to land on all fours. He took a step forward to make his way up the tree, hoping that he had enough strength to climb when he realized that yet another obstacle was in his way. This time it came in the form of a dog. A very large dog, with lots of sharp pointy teeth. It was eying him curiously, a low growl emanating from it as it looked at him as if it was deciding if he would be good to eat. The cat took a step back wondering if he could head back the way he came, but looking behind him, he saw a line of rats atop of the stone fence, glaring at him, their beady little eyes alight with malice.

The cat flopped down, and if he could, he would have both laughed and cried hysterically at the sheer amount of bad luck he was having. As he closed his eyes, waiting for the inevitable, he idly thought that maybe he had broken the mirror he had woken up next to, and that was the cause of the horrendous set of circumstances that he had been flung into.

The dog's growling came close and closer, when suddenly a dulcet voice cut through the air.

"Humphrey, stop that! Get away from that poor creature!" The cat had never heard this voice before, but something about it was oddly familiar.

He slowly opened his eyes to see a figure crouched above him. A young woman peered down at him, her blue eyes filled with concern. He blinked a few times, wondering if he had in fact died and maybe he was seeing an angel. Angels were usually pretty human females with blond hair, right? Wasn't she supposed to have wings?

When the female gingerly picked him up, he quickly decided that he wasn't dead, because he was pretty certain that it wasn't proper to hurt as much as he did when you were dead.

"Poor little puss," she cooed as she gently cradled him in her arms, "Oh! Your poor tail! What happened to it?" She gasped, her eyes brimming with tears, as she took out a handkerchief and tied it around the wound in an effort to staunch the blood flow. The cat did his very best to not move or make a sound as she ministered to him, knowing very well that she held his life in her hands. He was so very tired and it was all he could do to keep his eyes open. As one of her tears dropped onto his nose, the cat couldn't help to think that something was so very, very familiar about her. As more tears fell, the cat hoped that she wouldn't cry up a river and drown them both. It would be very inconvenient for that to happen after all the effort he made to get here.

As that stray though jumbled about his fuzzy brain, he startled slightly as he realized he was where he was supposed to be. The pulling sensation that had led him here had stopped as soon as she picked him up. He gazed into up into her face intently, struggling even harder to stay conscious, the memory of her was just slightly out of his grasp, teasing him. _I know you,_ he thought fiercely, _I know you, I know you, I KNOW you! What is your name?_ The memory flitted close to reveal a face, a younger face, a child's face.. But it was _her_ face.. He just knew it. And then suddenly, FINALLY, with the last of his strength, he caught the teasing memory and clawed and bit at it until it revealed a name.  
_Alice..._  
And right before he fell into unconsciousness he _remembered_...


End file.
